The Rev. Larry Gipson, who was dean of the Cathedral Church of the Advent in Birmingham from 1982-94 and rector at the largest Episcopal church in the nation from 1994-2008, has become a Roman Catholic.

Gipson retired in 2008 from the 8,000-member St. Martin's Episcopal Church in Houston, where his parishioners included former President George H.W. Bush and his wife, Barbara.

"The nature of authority in the Catholic Church is what attracted me to it," Gipson said in a telephone interview from his home in Houston. "After I retired, I was concerned and had been for many years about the Episcopal Church's authority structure."

Gipson will be among 69 candidates for Catholic priesthood attending a Formation Retreat this weekend in Houston, where the headquarters for the Ordinariate is based.

Among those leading seminars at the Formation Retreat in Houston will be the Rev. Jon Chalmers, who was ordained a Catholic priest in June, the second former Episcopal priest to be accepted as a priest under the Ordinariate. Chalmers served as curate, associate priest and interim rector at Canterbury Chapel in Tuscaloosa from 2007-2009.

His wife, Margaret Chalmers, former canon lawyer for the Catholic Diocese of Birmingham and now chancellor of the Ordinariate, will also be a presenter at the weekend retreat that runs Friday night through Sunday, Dec. 2.

"It's a really big deal," she said. "Larry Gipson, who was the priest of the largest Episcopal Church in America, is now a Catholic."

Although married Episcopal priests have been accepted as Catholic priests since 1983 under Pope John Paul II, only just over 100 came in during that process, Margaret Chalmers said.

This year, the Ordinariate through its faster process has already ordained 24 priests, with 69 in preparation. Her husband was accepted as a Catholic in January and ordained as a Catholic priest in June.

Venuti and Chalmers both have young children, as do many of the new Catholic priests, Mrs. Chalmers said. "There are lots of young priests with young kids," she said.

The Ordinariate allows the new Catholics to keep their Anglican form of worship, including the Book of Common Prayer.

Gipson and his wife of 48 years, Mary Frances, attend the headquarters church of the Ordinariate, Our Lady of Walsingham in Houston.

"All their services are Prayer Book services," Gipson said. "The music is from the 1940 (Episcopal) hymnal. It is the Anglican Rite One prayer book. It's the opportunity to come into the Catholic Church while maintaining Anglican tradition."

Although many Episcopalians have left the denomination over issues such as consecrating openly homosexual bishops and rites for same-sex unions, Gipson said he didn't leave the U.S. Episcopal Church and worldwide Anglican Communion in anger.

"I don't have the right to ask the Anglican Church to change its traditions for me," he said. "I'm the one who has got to make the changes. Anglicanism has always been hesitant to define doctrine because it has opposing factions. It has left doctrine blurry. People can believe almost mutually opposing beliefs."

Gipson, who turned 70 on Oct. 23, started attending an Episcopal church with his future wife when he was 14 in Memphis. "I'm thankful to the Episcopal Church," he said. "I spent my life there. All my friends and people I love are in it. I do not in any way wish to denigrate it. I'm not angry. I was seeking something that I've been longing for, for a long time."

Now, he's looking forward to the possibility of being ordained as a Catholic priest. Earlier this year he earned a master's degree in Catholic theology from St. Thomas University, although he already had a master of divinity degree from Yale University.

"I was an Episcopal priest for 42 years," he said. "I can't imagine not being a priest. I'm anxious to get back to priestly work."